Living Life As You
We don’t really start out living our own lives.
From the beginning, we’re learning how to be and who to be based on what’s around us.
We figure out how to walk, talk, act, respond… all through other people.
At home.
At school.
With friends.
It’s all input.
Constant input.
And a lot of that input is really about one thing—figuring out how to fit in.
What gets approval.
What doesn’t.
What keeps you included versus pushed out.
Why fitting in still runs the show
Humans are wired to fit in because, a long time ago, fitting in kept us alive.
If you were part of a group, you had protection, food, shared responsibility.
If you were pushed out, you didn’t last long.
So the brain learned:
Stay included at all costs.
That wiring didn’t go away.
Now it shows up as:
wanting approval
avoiding conflict
going along and not rocking the boat
choosing what keeps you accepted instead of what you actually want
What this looks like in real life
Saying yes when you know you’d rather say no
Choosing the “right” path—degree, job, relationship—because it makes sense to everyone else
Staying in relationships longer than you want to
It’s subtle.
You don’t usually sit there thinking, I’m living someone else’s life.
It just happens over time.
You start making decisions based on:
what’s expected
what avoids friction
what keeps things from becoming a problem
You follow the path that’s already laid out instead of stopping to ask if it’s even yours.
And somewhere in there, your own preferences, instincts, and direction get quieter.
Not gone.
Just covered up by everything you learned to do to function, belong, and not deal with consequences.
And then you see it… later
You said yes when you didn’t want to.
You reacted bigger than the situation called for.
You walked away thinking, that didn’t feel like me.
I can point to a moment in my own life where that happened in a way that changed everything.
When Todd asked me to marry him, he had wrapped himself in a box and put himself under my Christmas tree.
It was my birthday.
He had put thought into it—effort, meaning.
When he asked me to marry him, my mouth said yes.
But my whole body was saying no.
Not quietly.
It was there.
And I didn’t listen
Not because I consciously ignored it—I didn’t experience it as something I could act on.
There was no pause where I thought about what I wanted.
“No” didn’t feel like an available option.
There was just the moment…
the effort he had put in
not wanting to hurt him
what I thought I was supposed to want
And underneath it all:
What if this is my last chance?
So I said yes.
Looking back, it’s easy to judge it
“You should have said no.”
“You knew.”
“You ignored it.”
But that’s not what was happening.
I didn’t know in the way I know now.
I had a reaction.
And my brain made the decision based on what felt safest:
keeping the relationship
not hurting him
not risking being alone
It was trying to help.
It just wasn’t choosing what was right for me.
What actually changed everything
That moment changed the trajectory of my life.
Not because I consciously chose the wrong thing…
…but because I didn’t realize I wasn’t the one choosing.
And that’s the part most people miss.
Say it accurately
When you look back and say:
“I said yes.”
“I overreacted.”
“I stayed longer than I should have.”
Make sure you’re saying it accurately.
You didn’t have the awareness then that you have now.
You had a response.
Your brain made a call.
And you moved forward from there.
That doesn’t make it wrong
It means that was the best your brain could do with what it believed at the time.
You can’t go back and change those moments.
But you can start to recognize how similar decisions are still being made now.
The tension
The pull
The quiet “no” that doesn’t come out as words
That’s where things start to shift
Not by going back and fixing the past.
But by seeing more clearly what’s happening in the present.
And giving yourself the space to choose differently—
when it matters.
